Face scans – Infinite Unknown

Schools could be fitted with futuristic face scanners which screen pupils’ faces with an invisible infra-red light as they attempt to enter the building to keep out strangers.

The system, which is being trialled in a UK school next week, can also be used to allow children to take out library books and buy their lunch.

It is among a host of high-tech security measures introduced in schools in a bid to keep pupils safe.

Some schools have brought in fingerprint and eye scanners, while others are planning to put radio transponder chips in pupils’ uniforms to keep tabs on them.

But there are fears the technology breaches children’s civil liberties.

One school installed an iris scanner in 2003 but removed it a year later after it failed to recognise some students and led to lengthy queues.

Officials say automatic screening more accurate than checks by humans.

A face recognition system will scan faces and match them to biometric chips on passports. Photograph: Image Source/Getty

Airline passengers are to be screened with facial recognition technology rather than checks by passport officers, in an attempt to improve security and ease congestion, the Guardian can reveal.

From summer, unmanned clearance gates will be phased in to scan passengers’ faces and match the image to the record on the computer chip in their biometric passports.

Border security officials believe the machines can do a better job than humans of screening passports and preventing identity fraud. The pilot project will be open to UK and EU citizens holding new biometric passports.

But there is concern that passengers will react badly to being rejected by an automated gate. To ensure no one on a police watch list is incorrectly let through, the technology will err on the side of caution and is likely to generate a small number of “false negatives” – innocent passengers rejected because the machines cannot match their appearance to the records.

Face scanners to be installed in schools

Schools could be fitted with futuristic face scanners which screen pupils’ faces with an invisible infra-red light as they attempt to enter the building to keep out strangers.

Face scans for air passengers to begin in UK this summer